‘Bigger Fatter Liar’ Commits Crimes Against Cinema

Contrary to what Ron Oliver, the director of Bigger Fatter Liar might have believed, no one was, as Duran Duran might put it, “Hungry Like The Wolf” for a standalone sequel to Big Fat Liar. In fact, it’s doubtful that anyone even thought that a standalone sequel (whatever that means) of Big Fat Liar was possible at all. And yet, every one of the millions of Netflix subscribers find this … thing … at the tips of their fingers. There can be no introduction to this 94-minute, IMDb-page-having, rated-by-the-MPAA YouTube video calling itself a movie that does justice to the sheer revulsion one feels when watching Bigger Fatter Liar.

But the review must go on. Bigger Fatter Liar has decided that it has actors, even though that word doesn’t apply to the people in this movie. Ricky Garcia, an actor who is best known for his breakout role as Cool Kid in the episode “Gun Fever Too: Still Hot” of It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia and who has the worst case of an undercut in Hollywood, plays Kevin Shepard. Kevin is the most teenage-boyish of all the teenage boys in town. He has a “cool” room that slams the audience in the face with every possible signifier that, yes, a teenage boy lives here. He has more posters than wall space, he has desk toys, games, dirty clothes everywhere, an enormous desktop computer, and … three giant skulls stacked on top of each other. Just like every teenage boy. Kevin is also a pathological liar, a character trait shrugged off by the other characters but likely warrants intensive therapy, who is also a world-class programmer because of course he is. Kevin plagiarizes an entire paper and is caught by his teacher. This is especially nonsensical because Kevin, being the tech genius he is, should know of the existence and use of online plagiarism checkers. But Bigger Fatter Liar needed some way to redo the plot of Big Fat Liar “in its own words,” so the audience is expected to take this as gospel. Kevin is given the option of failing the class or writing a new paper due the next morning. If he fails, he faces a month-long suspension (what?) or summer school. The suspension makes no sense because Kevin’s school is a day away from summer vacation, even though Kevin and the other kids in this movie are all wearing these weird jackets all the time.

Kevin writes a paper about the plot for a video game and is on his way to hand it in when he hitches a ride from video game executive Alan Wolf (Barry Bostwick). Wolf steals his project, titled “Bigger Fatter Liar,” and rides off cackling into the sunset. Shepard is forced to go to summer school and vows revenge.

Through a series of lies, hijinks, and movie magic, Shepard and his friend/romantic interest/voice of reason Becca (Jodelle Ferland) find themselves in San Francisco. They go there in order to convince Wolf to come clean about stealing Shepard’s project, absolving him from his father’s disapproving looks.

Dynamic duo Kevin and Becca first meet with Wolf to ask him nicely to call Shepard’s father and tell him the truth. Wolf refuses to do so and, in true teenage fashion, Kevin and Becca literally ruin his entire life.

First, they commit massive fraud by stealing Wolf’s credit card and using it to fund their stay in San Francisco for the next three days. Then, they slowly enlist the help of all those Wolf has spurned over the course of his career. These people include: Ivan Slobodovich (Kevin O’Grady), a Russian limo driver who immediately proves his Russian-ness (and the writer’s prejudices) by advocating for burglary, arson, poisoning, murder, and multiple other crimes, Penny Lane (Fiona Vroom), Wolf’s subjugated personal assistant, and a slew of millennials that Wolf has employed. They use the help of these people in order to knock Wolf unconscious with a massive overdose of his own medication, permanently bleach his face white and his hair purple, and expose him as a jerk in front of his company and the world at large. Because Shepard couldn’t handle a month of summer school, they ruin a human being’s, albeit a mean one’s, entire life.

The entirety of Bigger Fatter Liar’s problems cannot be contained in this small review, nor one 10 times as long. Fortunately, this movie isn’t in theaters, so unsuspecting viewers can’t waste their money on tickets, but Bigger Fatter Liar is not worth the 94 minutes of time on this earth that it takes to watch. This movie is not worth the fractions of pennies it takes to power a television or a computer to play it. This movie is not worth the bandwidth it uses when streaming it over the internet. Sure, the young actors involved might have had a good time (as evidenced by the bloopers, as if this entire film isn’t a blooper in itself), but there were actual adults involved in the making of this movie. Real people, with real jobs, working to support themselves. Now they have this anchor tied to them, weighing down their proverbial balloon. None of the actors in this movie will go on to bigger and better things, but no one deserves to have been a part of this refuse.

If you like Big Fat Liar, Bigger Fatter Liar will make you hate it. If you like movies, this isn’t one. If you have the capacity to like things, Bigger Fatter Liar will replace that capacity with a gaping maw of hatred. Please, don’t watch this movie. Please.

Featured Image by Universal Studios

Related

Jacob is the Head Arts Editor for The Heights. He is from Winter Park, Florida and he is currently trying to watch every movie in existence (he’s pretty close). You can follow him on Twitter @schick_jacob or email him at [email protected]

1 Comment

Big Fat Liar had its charms and a heck of a comedic performance by Paul Giamatti. So, out of curiosity, I watched some of Bigger Fatter Liar on Netflix. I stopped after about 12 minutes. If they were so intent on doing a cheap remake, they should have just used the original’s screenplay instead of paying writers to come up with something during their lunch breaks at Pizza Hut.